Crazy Rich Asians (44 page)

Rachel laughed at the preposterous charm of her statement. “Peik Lin, I appreciate
your generosity, but you just
can’t
go around spending thousands of dollars on me. Now, I have money saved up for this
trip, and I will gladly pay for my own—”

“Fantastic. Go buy some souvenirs when you’re in Phuket.”

In a dressing suite at the other end of Patric’s atelier, two attendants were gingerly
tightening the corseted bodice of a scarlet Alexander McQueen gown on Amanda Ling,
still jet-lagged from having just stepped off a plane from New York.

“It needs to be tighter,” her mother, Jacqueline, said, looking at the attendants,
who each held one side of the gold silk cord hesitantly.

“But I can hardly breathe as it is!” Amanda protested.

“Take smaller breaths, then.”

“This isn’t 1862, Mummy. I don’t think this is actually supposed to be worn like a
real
corset!”

“Of course it is. Perfection comes at a sacrifice, Mandy. Which naturally is a concept
you seem to lack any understanding of.”

Amanda rolled her eyes. “Don’t get started again, Mummy. I knew
exactly
what I was doing. Things were going just fine in New York until you forced me to
fly back for this insanity. I was so looking forward to blowing off Araminta’s silly
wedding.”

“I don’t know what planet you’re living on, but things are not ‘just fine.’ Nicky
is going to propose to this girl
any minute now
. What was the whole point of my sending you to New York? You had one simple mission
to accomplish, and you failed miserably.”

“You have no appreciation for what I’ve accomplished for myself. I’m part of New York
society now,” Amanda proudly declared.

“Who gives a damn about that? You think anyone here is impressed to see pictures of
you in
Town & Country
?”

“He’s not going to marry her, Mummy. You don’t know Nicky like I do,” Amanda insisted.

“Well, for your sake I hope you’re right. I don’t need to remind you—”

“Yes, yes, you’ve said it for years. You have nothing to leave me, I’m the girl, everything
has to go to Teddy,” Amanda lamented sarcastically.

“Tighter!” Jacqueline ordered the attendants.

First Methodist Church

“
Another
security checkpoint?” Alexandra Cheng complained, peering out the tinted window at
the throngs of spectators lining Fort Canning Road.

“Alix, there are so many heads of state here, of course they have to secure the location.
That’s the Sultan of Brunei’s convoy ahead of us, and isn’t the vice premier of China
supposed to be coming?” Malcolm Cheng said.

“It wouldn’t surprise me if the Lees invited the entire Communist Party of China,”
Victoria Young snorted in derision.

Nick had departed at the crack of dawn to help Colin prepare for his big day, so Rachel
caught a ride with his aunts and uncle in one of the fleets of cars leaving from Tyersall
Park.

The burgundy Daimler finally arrived in front of First Methodist Church and the uniformed
chauffeur opened the door, causing the crowd crammed behind barricades to roar in
anticipation. As Rachel was helped out of the car, hundreds of press photographers
hanging off metal bleachers began snapping away, the sound of their frenzied digital
clicks like locusts descending on an open field.

Rachel heard a photographer yell to a newscaster standing on the ground, “Who’s that
girl? Is she someone? Is she someone?”

“No, it’s just some rich socialite,” the newscaster snapped back. “But look, here
comes Eddie Cheng and Fiona Tung-Cheng!”

Eddie and his sons emerged from the car directly behind Rachel’s. Both boys were dressed
in outfits identical to their father’s—dove-gray cutaway jackets and polka-dot lavender
ties—and they flanked Eddie obediently while Fiona and Kalliste followed a few paces
behind.

“Eddie Cheng! Look this way, Eddie! Boys, over here!” the photographers shouted. The
newscaster thrust a microphone in front of Eddie’s face. “Mr. Cheng, your family is
always at the top of the best-dressed lists, and you certainly didn’t disappoint us
today! Tell me, who are you wearing?”

Eddie paused, proudly placing his arms around his boys’ shoulders. “Constantine, Augustine,
and I are in Gieves & Hawkes bespoke, and my wife and daughter are in Carolina Herrera,”
he grinned broadly. The boys squinted into the bright morning sun, trying to remember
their father’s instructions: look straight into the camera lens, suck your cheeks
in, turn to the left, smile, turn to the right, smile, look at Papa adoringly, smile.

“Your grandsons look so cute all dressed up!” Rachel remarked to Malcolm.

Malcolm shook his head derisively. “Hiyah! Thirty years I have been a pioneering heart
surgeon, but my son is the one who gets all the attention—for his bloody clothes!”

Rachel grinned. These big celebrity weddings all seemed to be about the “bloody clothes,”
didn’t they? She was wearing an ice-blue dress with a fitted blazer trimmed with mother-of-pearl
disks all along the lapel and sleeves. At first she felt rather overdressed when she
saw what Nick’s aunts were wearing back at Tyersall Park—Alexandra in a muddy-green
floral dress that looked like eighties Laura Ashley, and Victoria in a geometric-patterned
black-and-white knit dress (so much for Peik Lin’s theory) that looked like something
dug up from the bottom of an old camphor-wood chest. But here, among all the other
chic wedding guests, she realized that she had nothing to worry about.

Rachel had never seen a crowd like this in the daytime—with the men sharply dressed
in morning suits and the women styled to within an inch of their lives in the latest
looks from Paris and Milan, many sporting elaborate hats or flamboyant fascinators.
An even more exotic contingent of ladies arrived in iridescent saris, hand-painted
kimonos, and intricately sewn
kebayas
. Rachel had secretly
been dreading the wedding all week, but as she followed Nick’s aunties up the slope
toward the Gothic redbrick church, she found herself succumbing to the festive air.
This was a once-in-a-lifetime event, the likes of which she would probably never witness
again.

At the main doors stood a line of ushers dressed in pinstriped morning suits and top
hats. “Welcome to First Methodist,” an usher said cheerily. “Your names, please?”

“What for?” Victoria frowned.

“So I can tell you which rows you’ll be sitting in,” the young man said, holding up
an iPad with a detailed seating chart glowing on its screen.

“What nonsense! This is
my
church, and I am going to sit in my regular pew,” Victoria said.

“At least tell me if you’re guests of the bride or groom?” the usher asked.

“
Groom
, of course!” Victoria huffed, brushing past him.

Entering the church for the first time, Rachel was surprised by how starkly modern
the sanctuary looked. Silver-leaf latticework walls soared to the stonework ceilings,
and rows of minimalist blond-wood chairs filled the space. There wasn’t a single flower
to be seen anywhere, but there was no need, because suspended from the ceiling were
thousands of young Aspen trees, meticulously arranged to create a vaulted forest floating
just above everyone’s heads. Rachel found the effect stunning, but Nick’s aunties
were aghast.

“Why did they cover up the red brick and the stained glass? What happened to all the
dark wooden pews?” Alexandra asked, disoriented by the complete transformation of
the church she had been baptized in.

“Aiyah, Alix, don’t you see? That Annabel Lee woman has transformed the church into
one of her ghastly hotel lobbies!” Victoria shuddered.

The ushers inside the church rushed around in utter panic, since most of the eight
hundred and eighty-eight
^*
wedding guests were completely ignoring the seating chart. Annabel had been advised
on the seating protocol by no less an authority than
Singapore Tattle
’s editrix in chief, Betty Bao, but even Betty was unprepared for the ancient rivalries
that existed among Asia’s old-guard families. She would not have known, for instance,
that the Hus should always be seated
in front
of the Ohs, or that the Kweks would not tolerate any Ngs within a fifty-foot radius.

Predictably, Dick and Nancy T’sien had commandeered two rows near the pulpit and were
turning away anyone other than T’siens, Youngs, or Shangs (in rare exceptions, they
were allowing in a few Leongs and Lynn Wyatt). Nancy, in a cinnabar-red dress and
enormous matching feather-brimmed hat, gushed excitedly as Alexandra and Victoria
approached. “Don’t you love what they’ve done? It reminds me of the Seville Cathedral,
where we attended the wedding of the Duchess of Alba’s daughter to that handsome bullfighter.”

“But we’re
Methodists
, Nancy. This is a sacrilege! I feel like I’m in the middle of the Katyn forest, and
someone is about to shoot me in the back of the head,” Victoria seethed.

Rosemary T’sien walked up the central aisle escorted by her grandson Oliver T’sien
and her granddaughter Cassandra Shang, nodding to people she knew along the way. Rachel
could already tell by Cassandra’s wrinkled nose that she did not approve of the decor.
Radio One Asia slipped in between Victoria and Nancy and launched into the latest
breaking news: “I just heard that Mrs. Lee Yong Chien is
furious
. She is going to talk to the bishop right after the service, and you know what
that
means—no more new library wing!”

Oliver, who was nattily dressed in a cream-colored seersucker suit, blue checked shirt,
and yellow knit tie, slipped in next to Rachel. “I want to sit next to you—you’re
the best-dressed girl I’ve seen all day!” he declared, admiring the understated elegance
of Rachel’s outfit. As the church continued to fill up, Oliver’s running commentary
on the arriving VIP guests had Rachel alternately mesmerized and in stitches.

“Here comes the Malay contingent—assorted sultanas, princesses, and hangers-on. Hmm,
it looks like
someone
got lipo. Lord have mercy, have you ever seen this many diamonds and bodyguards in
all your life? Don’t look now, I’m pretty sure that woman in the cloche hat is Faye
Wong. She’s an amazing singer and actress, famously elusive—the Greta Garbo of Hong
Kong. Ah, look at Jacqueline
Ling in that Azzedine Alaïa. On anyone else, that shade of pink would look slutty,
but on her it looks drop-dead perfect. And see that really thin fellow with the comb-over
being greeted so warmly by Peter and Annabel Lee? That’s the man
everyone
here wants to talk to. He’s the head of China Investment Corporation, which manages
the Chinese Sovereign Wealth Fund. They have more than four hundred billion in reserves …”

On the bride’s side of the aisle, Daisy Foo shook her head in awe. “The Lees got everyone,
didn’t they? The president and prime minister, all the Beijing top brass, Mrs. Lee
Yong Chien, even Cassandra Shang flew back from London—and the Shangs never come to
anything
! Ten years ago the Lees were fresh off the boat from Mainland China, and look at
them now—everyone who’s anyone is here today.”

“Speaking of
anyone
, look who just walked in … Alistair Cheng and Kitty Pong!” Nadine Shaw hissed.

“Well, she looks quite ladylike in that red-and-white polka-dot dress, doesn’t she?”
Carol Tai graciously offered.

“Yes, that ruffled skirt almost appears to cover her buttocks,” Lorena Lim noted.

“
Alamak
, let’s see what happens when she tries to sit with the Youngs. Wah, so
malu
^†
for them! I bet she’ll be thrown out of the row,” Nadine said with glee. The ladies
craned their necks to look, but much to their disappointment, Alistair and his new
fiancée were greeted cordially by his relatives and ushered into the row.